A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness. Inspired by an idea from Siobhan Dowd. Illustrated by Jim Kay.

From Amazon.com:

An unflinching, darkly funny, and deeply moving story of a boy, his seriously ill mother, and an unexpected monstrous visitor. At seven minutes past midnight, thirteen-year-old Conor wakes to find a monster outside his bedroom window. But it isn’t the monster Conor’s been expecting—he’s been expecting the one from his nightmare, the nightmare he’s had nearly every night since his mother started her treatments. The monster in his backyard is different. It’s ancient. And wild. And it wants something from Conor. Something terrible and dangerous. It wants the truth. From the final idea of award-winning author Siobhan Dowd—whose premature death from cancer prevented her from writing it herself—Patrick Ness has spun a haunting and darkly funny novel of mischief, loss, and monsters both real and imagined.

I’ve been waiting anxiously for the US publication of this book (it’s been available in the UK and Australia for months). Jim Kay’s illustrations were what first caught my attention when I read about this book online. Dark. Moody. Moving. Beautiful. (You may visit Jim Kay’s website here, where there are more images of his artwork, as well as more from this book. You may visit author Patrick Ness’ website here.)

I got a call on Tuesday from Quail Ridge Books that my pre-ordered copy was in—a pleasant surprise since I wasn’t expecting it until the end of the month. I picked it up after work, took it home, and read it in one sitting.

It’s a quick read, but not always an easy one. The stark prose and eerie illustrations set the tone of the story early on. Author Patrick Ness steers clear of sentimentality—ensuring that the story never strays from its original idea: that truth is often painful and unfair.

From his bedroom window, Conor can see a yew tree on top of a hill. One night, the yew tree takes on the form of a monster, shambles up to Conor’s window, and speaks to him. (The monster reminded me of another yew tree monster: Green Noah from Lucy Boston’s The Children of Green Knowe, although Patrick Ness’ monster, which speaks directly into Conor’s mind, I found to be scarier.)

The monster says to Conor:

Here is what will happen, Conor O’Malley. I will come to you again on further nights. And I will tell you three stories…And when I have finished my three stories, you will tell me a fourth. You will tell me a fourth, and it will be the truth.

The stories the monster tells Conor make him angry. A good prince is a murderer. An evil queen is rescued. An innocent farmer’s daughter dies for no reason. They seem like, in Conor’s own words, “a cheat.”

“I don’t understand,” Conor says, “Who’s the good guy here?”

There is not always a good guy. The monster says. Nor is there always a bad one. Most people are somewhere in between.

With each story the monster tells him, Conor faces more of life’s truths. And when it comes time for Conor to tell the fourth story, his story, his truth…the book draws to its inevitable conclusion.

The words and pictures deftly capture the fear and instability surrounding 13-year old Conor. The loneliness, the isolation, the frustration…he is dealing with bullies at school, an absent father, an emotionally distant grandmother…and on top of all of this, the guilt and pain of losing a parent.

As the story unfolds, you feel Conor’s fear and anger as he watches his mother succumb to cancer, and the ending of the story is apparent. Any other outcome would not fit the central idea of painful truths (it would be a “cheat”), but knowing the ending did not make the journey any less compelling, or the story any less powerful.

Parts of the story moved me deeply (the tender relationship between Conor and his mother), and parts were so spare and detached they bordered on being cold (the bullying scenes at school). But the honesty and grief of the story is both challenging and satisfying. It grabbed me and didn’t release its hold till the very end.

Stories are the wildest things of all. The monster tells Conor. Stories chase and bite and hunt… When you let them loose, who knows what havoc they might wreak?